= pkcs11-helper =

== About ==

[http://www.rsasecurity.com/rsalabs/pkcs/pkcs-11 PKCS#11] is published standard. PKCS!#11 is the de-facto standard to access cryptographic
devices.

pkcs11-helper is a library that simplifies the interaction with PKCS!#11
providers for end-user applications using a simple API and optional OpenSSL engine.

== Download ==

[source:/trunk/ChangeLog ChangeLog]

[http://www.opensc-project.org/files/pkcs11-helper Files]

=== Gentoo ===

[http://packages.gentoo.org/package/dev-libs/pkcs11-helper dev-libs/pkcs11-helper]

=== Debian ===

Contributed by S. Wefel.
[http://packages.debian.org/lenny/libpkcs11-helper1 libpkcs11-helper1]

== License ==

[source:/trunk/COPYING COPYING]

== Features ==

pkcs11-helper allows using multiple PKCS!#11 providers at the same time, enumerating
available token certificates, or selecting a certificate directly by serialized id,
handling card removal and card insert events, handling card re-insert to a different
slot, supporting session expiration and much more all using a simple API.

pkcs11-helper is not designed to manage card content, since object attributes
are usually vendor specific, and 99% of application need to access
existing objects in order to perform signature and decryption.

== Compatibility ==

 * The pkcs11-helper library is available in POSIX and WIN32 compliant systems.

 * The pkcs11-helper library should work with almost any PKCS!#11 provider, since it
   uses the minimum required features of the PKCS!#11 standard, a list of WorkingProviders
   is available.

== API Documentation ==

[http://www.opensc-project.org/files/pkcs11-helper/doc/api/ Here].

== Projects ==

 * [http://www.openvpn.net OpenVPN]
 * [http://alon.barlev.googlepages.com/openssh-pkcs11 OpenSSH PKCS#11 patch]
 * [http://gnupg-pkcs11.sourceforge.net GnuPG PKCS#11 smartcard daemon]
 * [http://delta.affinix.com/qca Qt Cryptographic Architecture PKCS#11 plugin]
 * [http://wiki.tuxonice.net/EncryptedSwapAndRoot Linux Disk Encryption Integration]
 * [http://alon.barlev.googlepages.com/gnutls-pkcs11 GnuTLS PKCS#11]
 * [http://ecryptfs.sourceforge.net PKCS#11 Key Module for eCryptfs]

== Authors ==

Alon Bar-Lev <[mailto:alon.barlev@gmail.com alon.barlev@gmail.com]>

== Thanks ==

[source:/trunk/THANKS THANKS]